AROUND the NBA:

[SleepingHero]

Politics... the anthem is shoved down our throats, again with heinous pro-slavery verses.  That's what the BLM movement is...  rethink what we have blindly accepted.  If you truly want to de-politicize the NBA, drop the anthem.  70% of NBA players are black.  You don't think the league should take that into consideration?  

Silver...  the boatload of money you refer to comes fans.  It's capitalism.  Boatloads of money = boatloads of fans giving their money.  It's the definition of success.

The league doesn't worry about the likes of you and me.  We're not going away.  It's about expanding the fanbase more than catering to we actual fanatics.  For me, the game has become more and more enjoyable.

I’m going to intentionally avoid the politics portion not because I don’t want to discuss it, but I just don’t want to discuss it here. Maybe we can talk about it more in ROTW? 

For the boatload of money. The majority of it comes from TV Network contracts paying for it. The rest does in some way come from fans, but I think that’s mostly due to inflated ticket prices and concessions. The fan is paying it, sure, but I don’t think that’s representative of fan engagement with the product as much as it’s people begrudgingly paying these prices because they want to see their favorite star that night once a year. 

As to the last paragraph, I 100% agree. The league could give less of a crap about you or I, because we’re going to watch no matter what.